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Green Peas, Avignonnaise
Place a pint fresh, tender, shelled peas in a saucepan with quart boiling water, a teaspoon salt, half teaspoon sugar, two saltspoons pepper and a teaspoon butter. Cover pan, boil forty minutes, thoroughly drain on a sieve, heat a teaspoon melted butter in a frying pan, add two ounces very finely chopped cooked ham and gently brown five minutes, frequently stirring meanwhile; add peas with half teaspoon chopped chives, teaspoon French mustard, one ounce butter, three saltspoons salt, saltspoon white pepper, and sprinkle over teaspoon flour, lightly toss on fire while cooking three minutes. Remove and use as required.
A straightforward pea garnish in the French manner, but the boiling time belongs to an era of older, starchier peas. Adjust that and the rest follows.
- Forty minutes is the one thing to changeFresh shelled peas are done in three to five minutes in boiling salted water; frozen peas need two. Forty minutes will leave grey mush with no sweetness. Long boiling times for peas are common in books of this period, though this recipe itself calls for peas that are fresh and tender.
- SaltspoonA saltspoon is a quarter teaspoon. So "two saltspoons pepper" is 1/2 teaspoon, "three saltspoons salt" is 3/4 teaspoon — and that is on top of the salted cooking water, so add it at the end to taste rather than by measure.
- French mustardMeans smooth Dijon, not the bright yellow American type. A teaspoon is enough to sharpen the butter without reading as mustard.
- The hamTwo ounces of cooked ham, chopped very fine — a scrap of good boiled or baked ham, or prosciutto cotto. Brown it gently: at high heat the small dice turn to hard flecks in under a minute.
- The flourA teaspoon of flour sprinkled over the buttered peas and tossed three minutes binds the butter and pea liquid into a light coating. Keep the pan moving so it cooks out and does not sit raw in patches.
- Quantity of butterBetween the teaspoon in the pan and the ounce added at the end this is a little over two tablespoons for a pint of peas. That is deliberate, and it is what makes the dish; cut it if you like, but it becomes a plainer buttered pea.
- YieldA pint of shelled peas serves about four as a side dish. The closing "use as required" suggests it was intended as a component rather than a standalone course.
The name points to Avignon. Peas cooked in the French style with ham or bacon fat were common in nineteenth-century cookery, and the dish is related to petits pois au lard. The closing "use as required" suggests the preparation was intended as a component rather than a dish in its own right.